


i can't not love you

by aebirdie



Series: happy spideytorch [3]
Category: Fantastic Four (Comicverse), Marvel, Spider-Man (Comicverse)
Genre: 5+1 Things, Happy Ending, M/M, angst kinda
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-29
Updated: 2019-09-29
Packaged: 2020-11-01 08:48:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,419
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20812358
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aebirdie/pseuds/aebirdie
Summary: five times Johnny told peter to wake up and one time peter said it back





	i can't not love you

1.  
“Petey, wake up,” Johnny whines, poking Peter’s ribs. Peter reaches out in his sleep, pushing Johnny away, but Johnny continued to pester him. “You said we could go on patrol together, and it’s _six pm_ already.”

“It’s not dark out,” Peter mumbles. “Patrol shamole, Flame Brain.”

“Who else is gonna catch the bad guys?” Johnny pesters, poking Peter again. “You’re seventeen, Web Head, not eighty. You should have more energy. I’m pretty sure something is wrong with you.”

“Something is wrong with _you_,” Peter grumbles, and then Johnny presses his hands to Peter’s skin, allowing his hands to warm up, not hot enough to burn, but warm enough to make Peter uncomfortable, no matter how much he wanted to sleep.

“Ouch, Johnny,” Peter says, and he hit Johnny over the head with a pillow.

“Let’s go kick ass, Spider-Man.”

*  
Peter is talking about something, like he always does, rambling about his boss or his aunt or his friends, who he won’t let Johnny meet, for some reason, even though Johnny’s pretty sure that they’ll love him, everyone does.

Johnny leans in, and it’s awkward and he’s kissed more of the corner of Peter’s mouth rather than his lips, but it’s weirdly perfect, for a first kiss.

“What was that for?” Peter asks, and there’s a spot of mustard on his cheek that Johnny wants to rub off, but he’s too nervous that he’s made everything awkward.

“I just wanted too,” Johnny says.

“Do it again.”

Johnny does.

2.  
“Pete,” Johnny says, his chin on Peter’s shoulder, hand untangling Peter’s soft curls, “you gotta wake up, Sue’s gonna see you.”

“Good morning to you too, I guess.”

“Sue—she can’t know yet,” Johnny says, getting off his bed and grabbing Peter’s mask. “Please? For me?”

“Cuddling next time,” Peter says, and he pulls on his mask and jumps out the window. Johnny watches him go, that familiar feeling in his chest rising every time he sees Peter jump. He knows Peter’s gonna catch himself, but he’s always worried that he _won’t_.

Johnny watches him swing for a while, before getting on with his day, because watching Peter swing, no matter how nervous Johnny gets that he’ll fall, is beautiful.

“Spider-Man, huh?” Sue says from behind him and Johnny jumps.

3.  
“Peter,” Johnny says, and of course, Peter’s asleep, because it’s all he ever does, “wake up, yeah? We need to talk.

“I miss you,” Johnny hears Peter mumble into the pillow. “Please, Johnny, you and me again. Please, I need you. I _need_ you.”

“C’mon, Web Head,” Johnny whispers. “Don’t do this to me, man.”

“I don’t know how to be just friends with you,” Peter tells him, and then he leaps out the window, and Johnny doesn’t watch him go. It hurts, and Johnny’s trying to move on from him, because he’s twenty-one, for God’s sake, and he’s only been in one relationship. Crystal said it herself, he needed to branch out.

Branching out was a terrible idea, especially since all Johnny can think about on the dates Crystal sets up for him is Peter. He spent a date on Twitter the whole time, watching a livestream of Peter fighting the Rhino, and tweeting from his Spider-Man fan account, which was embarrassing, to have a fan account dedicated to your ex. But here he was, laying down on Peter’s side of the bed, where Peter had just been, thinking about how he was going to win Peter back.

*  
It takes a month for Peter to meet him at their usual spot again, and when he does, Peter’s talking about MJ Watson, and their _date_. Johnny usually doesn’t have an issue with MJ. She’s perfect and nice and if Johnny was into girls, he’d be into MJ Watson, but now she was going out with Peter, and he kind of wanted to interrupt their dates and burn her favorite pair of shoes.

And the next thing he knows, he’s deep in the Negative Zone, pushing Ben out of the way and telling him to run, and when he shouts _FLAME ON_, he’s thinking about Peter kissing MJ, and he burns a little hotter.

4.  
“Pete,” Johnny says, softly, and they’re in Peter’s crappy apartment, even though Sue said that Peter had been living with them, “wake up.”

“Go away, Johnny,” Peter says quietly. “I—I can’t. I can’t do this right now. You were dead, Johnny.”

“I’m here now,” Johnny pleads.

“We broke up. You dumped me, you ass.”

“Pete, c’mon.”

“I don’t know how to not love you, Johnny,” Peter says, and Johnny’s throat tightens. “And I tried, like really tried, to not love you, but I just can’t. I can’t not love you.”

“I can’t not love you either,” Johnny tells him. “When we broke up, I thought—I thought I needed to find myself, or something. I don’t think I can love anyone else like I love you.”

“That’s gay,” Peter says, turning in bed to face Johnny, and there are tears cleaning through the grime on his face.

“No, you are,” Johnny shoots back, and then Peter pulls him in for a kiss, and it’s the first time they’ve kissed in six months, and man, Johnny’s missed it. Missed _him_.

Johnny kisses him back.

5.  
“Peter,” Johnny gasps, and Peter’s lying there, head rolling on the concrete, and the kid, the younger Spider-Man, is sobbing. “Pete, wake up. Wake up.” Johnny shakes him and then shakes him some more, and Peter doesn’t have a pulse.

“I could’ve stopped him,” the younger Spider-Man cries out, his small frame shaking as he cries. “Stupid Rhino, got in our way for training, I could’ve—”

“There wasn’t anything you could’ve done,” Johnny tells, him, but his voice is listless, and God, he’s going to be sick. He feels empty, and he knows what Peter would say, right now. He’d critique his mistakes with the Rhino, crack a couple jokes, kiss Johnny on the cheek, and swing off, the younger Spider-Man swinging after him. _See you at home_ he would say. _Told the kid I’d help him with biology homework, but I’ll be home to make you dinner, princess_.

There’s noise around him, but Johnny’s focused on picking up Peter’s body from the road, and the poor kid is shaking. Johnny looks at him, just for a minute, trying to figure out what Peter would tell him. What Peter would do.

“Pick yourself up, kid,” Johnny says, adjusting Peter’s weight in his arms. “Can’t let one fight drag you down like this, alright?”

“Alright,” the kid says, and then one of his friends, Nova, touches down next to him and wraps his arms around Spider-Man’s shoulders. “I just—I don’t know what to do. Without Peter.”

What was that thing Peter was always saying? “With great power comes responsibility,” Johnny says, and he’s not sure that he got the quote right, he’s too tired to think and Peter feels heavy, although he’d oddly light, for his strength.

“I’m here for you,” Johnny hears Nova whisper, and Spider-Man, the only Spider-Man now, nods. Johnny flies away, just so no one sees him cry.

+1  
“Johnny,” Peter says, standing over Johnny’s sleeping figure. God, he’s so beautiful. Peter would die and come back, just to see him, all over again. “Wake up.”

“Hggf,” Johnny says, and he rolls onto his stomach, face smushed into the pillow. He’s on Peter’s side of the bed, which is so annoying typical of Johnny Storm. But Peter grins anyways, because he’s back, and Johnny’s in their apartment, on his side of the bed.

“Flame Brain,” Peter tries. “Wake up, yeah? I need you to roll over so I can sleep, c’mon, you lug.”

“Shut up already, Pete,” Johnny says, waving a hand, and then his brain catches up to his mouth, and his head shoots up, confusion masking his face. “Peter?”

“Hey, hot stuff,” Peter says, waggling his eyebrows, and Johnny starts to sob, so loud their neighbors can probably hear, which might not be the best thing to wake up to at three am, but Johnny cries anyways, neighbors be damned.

“You’re here,” Johnny chokes out. “Jeez, Pete. Knew you could never stay away.”

“Not even Death can keep me from your hot ass, Storm.”

Johnny rolls his eyes, and man, how Peter’s missed him, even the snarky eye rolls and huffed breaths. Johnny hugs him, and hugs him tight, until Peter’s sides start to ache.

“So,” Peter says. “You gonna kiss me, or what?”


End file.
